


Unzip my body, undo my heart

by Rena



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, F/M, Genderswap, Schmoop, also mentions of Sam/Jess, and Sam/Madison, and Sam/Ruby, and of course Gabriel/everything that moves, fem!Gabriel, mentioned Dean/Castiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-02
Updated: 2012-06-02
Packaged: 2017-11-06 14:39:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/420017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rena/pseuds/Rena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The weirdest thing is that he wakes up next to her, because Gabrielle doesn't do that. It’s rule #2 in her Book Of (Sex) Life Rules. Number 1 is "don’t sleep with the same guy twice" (as in, you can fuck him twice but only if that happens in the same night) and number 2 is "don’t stay overnight and don’t let anyone stay overnight". Sam wonders whether he’ll get a cookie for being special.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unzip my body, undo my heart

**_Unzip my body, undo my heart_ **

**_._ **

_Some people fall in love and touch the sky. Some people fall in love and find quicksand. I’m somewhere in between, I swear. I can’t make up my mind._

_Incubus - Quicksand_

**_._ **

Gabrielle Novak is, as Dean said when he first saw Sam following her with his gaze, the kind of woman who would eat you alive and smile her most beautiful, seductive predatory smile as she gnaws the flesh off your bones, and all the men would stand around and watch and then willingly offer themselves up as the next sacrificial lamb.

Or something like that.

She doesn’t look it at first sight. She’s pocket-sized and yeah, okay, Sam wouldn’t use the word _cute_ because she is too freaking hot (and all too aware of it, too) to merit that sort of vocabulary, and honestly, if you ask him, everyone who approaches her and thinks she’s just a pliant little girl you can have your way with is either completely blind or utterly stupid. It’s probably the size that lures rather large groups of men into believing she is relatively harmless. Because yeah, she’s small and has _really_ mouth-watering curves (come on, every man can appreciate a nicely filled-out B-cup and a firm, round ass) and a flat stomach although she’s constantly eating sweet stuff, and isn’t afraid of showing them, and the last part is the thing that should be the final clue serving to alert the Y-chromosome bearers to the notion that she may be small but she is anything but innocent. But of course, once men lay an eye on her, they generally stop thinking too quickly to worry about that.

Anyway, ‘not innocent’ doesn’t necessarily equal man-devouring, intelligent-and-sassy-as-fuck vamp and when you talk about Gabrielle Novak you have to put checkmarks behind all of the above and more, and well, maybe we should really start with the beginning.

So Sam Winchester sees Gabrielle for the first time when she struts into the introductory pre-law lecture on Monday morning of the first year of undergrad at Stanford like she owns the world. She’s twenty minutes too late and utterly unbothered by the professors’ scolding look and the stares she receives from the fellow students that range from hungry horniness (90 percent of the men) to scandalised jealousy (most of the females) to annoyance at being interrupted (the one or two nerds who are too engrossed by articles and clauses and too hopelessly virginal as to enjoy the scarce clothing and the fierce attitude).

Contrary to popular belief Sam’s first thought is not that she is hot (okay, that’s totally a lie, because he’s a guy with eyes and we have already established that you can’t help but acknowledge that when you’re in possession of certain body features) but that she must definitely, one-thousand-percent have walked into the wrong room, because no law student is dressed in denim hot pants and a shirt showing that much cleavage _ever_. He’s not exactly in the ‘I must wear a suit because pre-law is a respectable career and my parents are filthy rich’ club, but he knows that _Legally Blonde_ is just a movie and there aren’t actually girls like Elle Woods on campus that would share his classes outside of his more x-rated dreams. But instead of apologising or making a quip and turning around to prance out of the room again, the small bombshell of a woman just smirks at the wolf-whistles she gets, drops down on a free seat two rows down, pulls out her copy of _Introduction to American Law_ as well as a lollipop and a pen and leans forward on her elbows to listen to the teacher more or less interestedly.

To his shame, Sam has to admit that he quickly files her under ‘wow hot damn I’d tap that’ but also under ‘yeah pretty sure she isn’t going to be here long’ and (and that’s really the worst one because he usually tells himself he doesn’t do prejudices and clichés) under ‘dresses slutty so probably stupid and unfit for law school’.

It’s a good thing she proves him – and everyone else – wrong only ten minutes later when she starts a heated argument about the pros and cons of the death penalty which leads to a discussion of how to deal with what she dubs Wall Street Assholes (and boy does she know about that stuff, it’s amazing) and taxes and politics and corruption and warfare while the poor professor just kind of stands in front of the class opening and closing his mouth like a fish and looking utterly lost because he can’t get a single word in edgewise. Then someone makes a comment about bitches or sluts or something that Sam doesn’t even remember but _Jesus H. Fucking Christ_ she turns the entire class into a lecture on feminism and slut-shaming at the end of which Sam can only stare at her in silent awe because he has never seen anyone speak with such determination and fierceness and commitment. When the bell rings to signal the end of the class he is mind boggled and thinks that okay, apparently she does belong in this class after all, more so than 95% of the fuckers warming the seats here. He walks out of the room still in a sort of haze, but to this day he remembers clearly how the guys walking in front of him sneer about how she obviously needs some dick to loosen up, and he is one second away from punching them in their stupid faces (which is surprising in itself, because yeah, he has anger management issues sometimes, but he has never wanted to punch anyone he doesn’t even know before) and her turning around, smiling sweetly and saying “Oh, believe me, I get more dick in a week than you will get pussy in your entire life,” and flipping them off casually, leaving without bothering to turn around once more, and the thing is, Sam believes her immediately.

So, long story short, Gabrielle is pretty fucking amazing and every guy’s – and not a few girls’ – wet dream. Sam would be a hypocrite if he said he didn’t think about it, but he mostly steers clear of her, not because he doesn’t like her or disapproves of her lifestyle or anything, but because they are pretty much polar opposites and the idea of them hanging out with each other is ludicrous.

Also, she wastes no time proving her statement was no understatement. Sam isn’t exactly the party type – he enjoys going to bars and having beers but dancing and discos and frat parties where everyone’s goal is merely to get as shitfaced as possible without throwing up aren’t his thing – but his buddy Brady is, and so he hears a lot of stories about her adventurous love life. According to various sources, she picks up someone new at least once a week. Apparently, she goes by a strict One-Night-Stands-Only rule, and when she says One Night Stand, she means One Night Stand and makes a point of never taking the same guy home twice. It doesn’t take long until half the campus knows her, and she becomes the object of some kind of weird-ass, typical caveman-style challenge where every guy who has the balls to approach her and the self-esteem of the Chrysler building telling them that they are so much better than the rest try to hook up with her and get her to break the One Time Only rule.

It goes without saying that every single one of them fails miserably. Sam thinks that Gabrielle not so secretly enjoys this game. Not only does she get laid on a regular basis (because seriously, the guys are lining up to get into bed with her) but she also gets the weekly satisfaction of shooting the guys down. She gets called a bitch and a slut a lot, but only ever behind her back, because no one dares to say that to her face; chances are she’ll claw your eyes out, and she is still the most desired girl in all of Stanford. She and her best friend Kali – who dresses classier but follows roughly the same no-relationship policy – are the main targets of male advances.

Anyway.

Point is, they frequent different circles, and he doesn’t really see her outside of class. Well, he sees her on his (and her) daily morning jog, always at six a.m. sharp when she steps out of her door as he runs past, putting the earphones in and turning the music up and following him until they reach the park and she turns right while he turns left. He used to be worried about her, because this is a routine she doesn’t abstain from even when it’s still dark outside, and America isn’t exactly a country with low rape rates and there are way too many bushes a man could pull her into unnoticed at this early hour, but that is before he sees her one night when Brady drags him to a party and he watches her fending off the unwanted advances of a very, very drunk and very, very rude classmate. She tells him to fuck off sweetly two times, and when he tries to grab her breasts, she hits him square in the face and, in a blur of a movement, does something that sends him crashing down to the floor.

After that, everyone has a lot more respect and -  although no guy would ever admit it -  fear, and since these kinds of stories spread faster on campus than the swine flu hysteria did, no one makes the same mistake ever again. When she tells someone to fuck off, even the biggest men with the greatest egos back away in horror. Also, they are still usually waking up the next day to someone having decorated their car with glitter or Nair (or, alternatively, pink dye) in their shampoo, because she is one hell of a prankster, and sneaky at that. Gabrielle always looks smug after these incidents, and Sam, while mildly disapproving of her actions, stops worrying (which, he is sure, would have made her laugh at him in the first place, because she doesn’t need anyone worrying about her; she takes care of herself, she defends herself and she is always fine).

In Gender Studies (of course she is in Gender Studies, why is he even surprised at that? She’s a feminist after all, not the kind that mindlessly hates guys, but the one who fights for her right to sleep around without being called a slut, to be able to behave exactly like the regular male student does without being treated differently) she says Brian Kinney is her spirit animal and quotes him directly (and no, Sam is not going to tell you why he even knows that): _“ _I don’t believe in love. I believe in fucking. It’s honest, it’s efficient; you get in and out with a maximum of pleasure and a minimum of bullshit.” Sam listens and nods to himself and thinks that yeah, that’s her right and he’d still take her up on the offer if she ever were to make one, but it’s a sign that they are definitely not made for each other. Because Sam believes in love even if that makes him a giant sap according to his brother and he’s not afraid to admit it, thank you very much, and the fact that she scoffs at the notion allows her to stay in his wet dream material but not in the ‘possible future girlfriend’ category.__

__So, the first year of studying passes like this: he sees her around, watches her sometimes and mostly gets into passionate discussions with her in every class they share (which is pretty much every single class, so he assumes she knows his name now, although he can never be sure because they never talk outside of class). Sometimes they agree, sometimes they disagree, but in any case, they are a good team when it comes to that, which is really, really weird considering that they are complete strangers, but hey, he is not going to complain because some professors start giving them extra credit for their regular and intelligent participation._ _

__In addition to that, his older brother Dean gets a job in town as a mechanic and decides to move there, because they are somewhat co-dependent and neither will ever admit it but staying apart from  one another longer than a month without being able to see each other has been hell, so when the end of the year comes around, they move into a small and a little run down but comfy flat together and Dean even enrols in Mechanics after Sam bugs him long enough (because Dean is smarter than he admits and totally able to complete his studies even though he’s more of a practical, working-with-my-hands type than Sam who likes to ponder deep and meaningful and abstract problems all day, every day)._ _

__Then, just when the new term has just started, he meets Jess. Jessica Moore is tall and slender and sweet and quiet and wants to be a primary school teacher and he really thinks she is perfect. And definitely picket-fence, two kids and a dog in a suburb material. Most importantly, Sam_ _ ___likes_ __her, he really does. They agree to take it slow and he takes her on romantic dates that Dean laughs at but silently approves of and to the nicest dinner his wallet can afford, and he kisses her in the car and thinks, yes, this can be nice._ _

__Unfortunately, it’s also the same time at which he gets assigned a group project, a presentation of tax law that they have to do in pairs. And because fate hates him – or loves him, maybe, he isn’t so sure about it – his assigned partner is Gabrielle. One the one hand, he’s glad, because he knows she is invested – usually, but tax law bores everyone, even him – and she is one of the people on top of that class next to him, and on the other, he wants to shoot himself or jump off a cliff or probably both. Because Gabrielle may be extremely intelligent, but from what he can tell she is also lazy as fuck (he doesn’t think he has seen her studying seriously ever) and has the attention span of a piece of toast if she doesn’t care about what people are talking about, and she also talks too much about stuff that doesn’t have anything to do with their project, and watching her eat candy all the friggin time is giving him tooth aches, and did he mention that her boobs are really fucking distracting?_ _

__Still, they get along, mostly. Gabrielle has a lot of fascinating and hilarious stories to tell, from places she has been to and people she has met and pranks she has pulled, and Sam likes that she calls people out on their bullshit and is smart and witty and God, the words that come out of her mouth, the things she_ _ ___does_ ____with her mouth, mostly to candy bars and lollipops, but can you blame a guy for having a vivid imagination and wondering what else she could do with that mouth when she practically showcases her talents under his nose?_ _

__Sam is convinced he’s being subtle in the way he watches her, studies her soft curves and the dark blonde hair falling over her shoulders and these fascinating honey and green coloured eyes, but as it turns out, he isn’t, or maybe Gabrielle is simply more observant than he gives her credit for. Either way, the result is the same. It’s mid-October and dark outside and they have been working for hours and he has spent the last hour trying not to follow the way her tongue twirls around stick candy, which is nothing short of pornographic, and he is really glad when they decide to call it a day and head home. He picks up his books to stuff them in his bag when a small hand comes up to his collar and Gabrielle, with a surprisingly strong grip, pulls him down and smashes her lips against his. Sam gasps in surprise and she uses the opportunity to start her merry journey of exploring his mouth with her tongue and all coherent thoughts about him having a sort-of-kind-of-girlfriend-and-what-the-fuck-is-this-anyway go on a long holiday in Zimbabwe, because_ _holy shit_ _. Just when he is starting to enjoy himself, though, she pulls back, gives him the most radiant grin he has ever seen and pats him on the stomach._ _

__“There you got your answer, sasquatch,” she says cheerily._ _

__Sam blinks. “Huh?” he says, the very image of his usual exceptional eloquence, thinks for a second and comes to the conclusion that no, he has still no idea what the hell is going on._ _

__“You were wondering,” Gabrielle says, “what I could do with my mouth, so I thought I’d be nice and give you a little demonstration.” And then she walks off with swinging hips and she’s fucking_ _ ___whistling_ __and leaves him standing in the library, perplexed and unable to form a thought that is more articulate than_ _ _what the actual fuck_ __._ ___

__Things become decidedly weird after that. Well, they are weird for him. Gabrielle appears the next day, still all chipper and cheerful, and doesn’t mention the kiss once. That’s enough for him to know that it was just a source of amusement for her, and he’s sort of glad that she at least has the decency not to mock him with it. It’s really not easy to forget about it, though, and he spends the next weeks in the constant fear and hopeful anticipation of her jumping him. Which doesn’t happen, by the way. And which only makes him feel guilty, because things with Jessica might finally progress to a stage where they might get really serious and he knows they would be great together and it’s really unfair of him to think about Gabrielle all the damn time._ _

__So maybe one could say the day at the library was The Day Sam’s Life Went Off The Rails. Some might say that happened as early as the first time she walked into class._ _

__For the sceptics, we can establish that if you are unwilling to concede either theory, Halloween is definitely the turning point, which just fucking figures._ _

__Sam hates Halloween. He really, really does. The whole thing with the dressing up in mostly not even remotely scary outfits and the candy and the trick or treat is just ridiculous, and there’s nothing he wants to do less than go to the party that night, but Jess asked him and he’s trying to be a good boyfriend, so he goes, albeit undisguised. And because fate is a bitch and all his luck has deserted him, Gabrielle shows up as well, in a scarily accurate and detailed Loki cosplay (only with a much, much shorter leather outfit) and dear God, she even has a small stuffed animal horse on which she has sewn four additional legs that she carries around under her arm all the time. It’s adorable as fuck, which really isn’t an adjective he thought he’d use for her, ever, but she’s good at throwing him for a loop._ _

__The party itself isn’t the problem, nor is her presence, or at least it wouldn’t be if he could tell his subconscious – and his lower body parts, for that matter – to shut up and leave him alone. But tonight, the big Freudian_ _ _Id_ __is winning the race and Jess isn’t stupid. He knows that she knows the minute she comes back with drinks and looks at him sadly._ _

__“It’s not-“_ _ _what you think it is_ __, he wants to say, but it’s exactly what she thinks it is. He’s pining for another girl in his girlfriend’s presence. It’s A-class douchebaggery and Sam hates himself for it._ _

__Jess, being the sweet girl she is, is way too forgiving. “It’s okay,” she says, although it’s really, really not, and gives him a kiss on the cheek that is most definitely and permanently goodbye. Sam wants to ask her to stay and explain to her that no, he doesn’t want to lose her because Gabrielle is nothing but a fleeting, fancy idea in his head and she can never give him the safety and calm life he wants, he wants Jess, he wants to want Jess and he doesn’t know what’s wrong with him, but he keeps his mouth shut and lets her walk away, because Jessica deserves better than this._ _

__And because his life officially sucks, Gabrielle goes home with another guy that night and Sam gets horribly drunk with Brady before staggering home and getting into the shower to jerk off to thoughts of all kinds of variations of Gabrielle and leather, and when he wakes up in the morning, he has the worst headache in the history of headaches and spends half of the morning throwing up, which, yeah, he probably deserved. Dean hollers at him a little for being stupid enough to fuck things up with Jess and shows absolutely zero pity. That, too, is all too deserved._ _

__He resolves to get the ridiculously small and ridiculously hot loudmouth out of his head. It works fine for about six weeks. They finish their project and present it and he can go back to keeping his distance and not talking to her outside of class (the last part is more difficult because apparently Gabrielle has decided that sometimes, he is a fun distraction, and she’ll seek him out to complain about stuff when Kali isn’t around)._ _

__Then the last day of classes before the holidays comes along and Sam is stupid enough to let people persuade him to come to a party. Again. As if the last time wasn’t lesson enough. But he doesn’t have a girlfriend now and Dean is out and he doesn’t have anything better to do (no valid excuse, either), so off he goes._ _

__And since Gabrielle doesn’t miss a single party on campus, naturally, she is there._ _

Of course, that leads to what he thinks will be another night spent in miserable, lonely pining, so he surreptitiously stocks up on his alcohol supply by reserving an entire bottle of eggnog all for himself. He pretends to talk to Brady, Zach and Becky and feigns interest in what they are going on and on about, but what he really wants to do is watch the way Gabrielle’s hands fly when she talks fast and excitedly, how no part of her ever stands still but is constantly in motion like a rare breed of a butterfly, and how she throws back her head when she laughs, exposing the smooth, tanned skin of her neck that’s just made to be nibbled on.

A little after midnight she comes over to his table and he braces himself for another round of his _I am really not watching you because I am not interested at all_ game and puts on his most innocent face. He likes to think he’s gotten good at that.

“So, Sam,” she says casually, putting down her bottle of beer and sliding in close. He swears he can feel the heat radiating off her body. “Are you ever gonna make a move or is it my duty to jump you to get you to act on that more than obvious attraction of yours to me?”

“I- uh – not – I-“ Sam splutters, and Gabrielle raises a critical eyebrow, just looking at him expectantly, and Sam thinks what the hell, this is most likely the only time she will ever make that offer and he’d hate himself forever if he didn’t take her up on it. He doesn’t quite trust himself with words – he’d probably make a fool out of himself and he doesn’t want to appear over-excited, although he is and she probably knows it too – so he just shrugs on his jacket and grabs her wrist and pulls her through the crowd and out of the room.

They go to her place, because it’s less than a block away and not even five minutes later he is sitting on her bed with a warm, soft lap full of Gabrielle in his hands and they’re kissing as if their lives depended on it and losing clothes at an almost alarmingly fast rate. There is nothing slow or gentle about it, nothing like it was with Jess and he is most definitely not complaining, because despite what Dean may think he does _not_ cry his way through sex and he likes it better when it’s a little rough. He should have figured that Gabrielle would be anything but passive in bed and they are kind of fighting for dominance the entire time, hands roaming over hot, sweaty bodies and pushing and pulling urgently, and judging from the smile that spreads on her face she is enjoying the little display of power just as much as he does. Because he might have the height and weight advantage over her, but Gabrielle knows what she wants and she knows how to get it, using every last weapon in her arsenal and Jesus Christ, she is _flexible_ in a way that should be illegal for anyone who isn’t a yoga teacher and that throws him off every coherent train of thought more than once. He learns that she likes to have her hair pulled and when he nibbles on her earlobe, and she displays a rather prominent fascination with his ass and digs her fingers hard enough into his shoulder blades that he expects to find bruises there in the morning. All in all, it’s loud and it’s hot and it’s filthy and he honestly didn’t believe he could last that long, because this definitely registers as the best night of his life, and when they finally collapse next to each other and she runs her tongue over her lower lip he tells himself that damn, this is the only night he will ever get to enjoy this so he’d better make the most of it. The alarm clock on the night stand reads 3:42 in bright red numbers and he sighs, because he just needs five minutes, or maybe ten, of rest before he’ll try to convince her to go for another round.

He realises he must have drifted off to sleep without meaning to when he blinks his eyes open to the faint first crack of dawn. There’s a soft, warm weight sprawled over his side and stomach and it only takes him a moment to realise that it’s Gabrielle cuddling him. Which – huh. Yeah, he might have pegged her for the cuddling type if he didn’t know about her adventures, so this comes as a surprise. The weirdest thing, though, is that she is peacefully asleep in his arms. It’s not that it feels weird or anything – not at all, in fact, it feels really comfortable and right now he could stay like this forever – but he knows Gabrielle doesn’t do that. It’s rule #2 in her Book Of (Sex) Life Rules. Number 1 is _don’t sleep with the same guy twice_ (as in, you can fuck him twice but only if that happens in the same night) and number 2 is _don’t stay overnight and don’t let anyone stay overnight._ Everyone knows that waking up next to one-night stands is usually pretty awkward, so he knows that she follows this rule meticulously in order to not complicate things, ever.

Which makes him wonder why she didn’t kick him out last night like she did with countless others. Maybe she was more intoxicated than she let on, but she had seemed pretty sober, and it was universally acknowledged that Gabrielle could drink anyone under the table and he’d watched her, she hadn’t been drinking a lot, so that was unlikely.

Sam groans quietly. Should he stay, pretend to be asleep? Or take his clothes and go?

Either way, he needs to go to the bathroom, like, half an hour ago, so he slips out of bed and fishes for his boxers. Luckily, he gets the right door at first try. He feels approximately ten times better after relieving himself and figures what the hell, maybe she has some coffee in the kitchen. He could do with some coffee. And maybe a chunk of bread, because they didn’t have anything left in the fridge last night and he hasn’t eaten in almost fifteen hours and his stomach is starting to protect loudly against that.

Except when he opens the fridge and searches the cabinets he finds eggs and flour and milk and syrup and a big bowl and is hit with the craze of making pancakes. He knows he’s making a fool out of himself and she’ll probably want him out as quickly as possible, but hey, he can at least make her breakfast in exchange for the best night of his life. Pancakes are Gabrielle’s favourite for breakfast – he knows that because he’s seen her in the cafeteria often enough – and although he usually doesn’t eat unhealthy stuff that early in the morning (or unhealthy stuff in general, period), he has gotten pretty good at whipping them up, because for some strange reason, they are Dean’s preferred hangover food.

Ten minutes later, he is mixing all the ingredients together and starting to feel extremely cheerful when someone who is most definitely not Gabrielle clears their throat and addresses him. “Good morning.”

Sam almost drops the eggbeater and cringes before turning around to come face to face with a tall, lanky black haired and trenchcoat-clad man who eyes him with a mixture of puzzlement and wonder and tilts his head like he is some strange, unknown insect. Which, well, is probably not the worst reaction one can have upon finding a stranger rummaging your kitchen in a pair of boxers. Sam can feel awkward about his lack of clothes for about a second before panic kicks in, because oh God, he always thought Gabrielle lived with Kali, but this is not the kind of guy her best friend would hook up with, ever, and she never mentioned any flatmates, so that doesn’t leave too many possibilities. Fuck.

Anyway, the guy is obviously still waiting for a reaction, so Sam gets control over his inner panic attack for long enough to blurt out, “Uh, I – I’m not a burglar.”

_Smooth, Sam, very smooth._

The man blinks. “I was unaware that it was customary for burglars to make breakfast in their underwear in the flat they entered,” he says dry as bone but with a small smile. “Therefore, I had reached this exact conclusion.”

“Um,” Sam says, because he is proving to be really eloquent this morning. Way to go, A-plus student, top of your class, full scholarship at Stanford, way to go. “Sorry, I-“

“It’s fine,” the stranger replies, smiling a little wider. “I was merely taken by surprise. It is not often that my sister’s...acquaintances spend the night.” The words ‘unheard of’ stay unsaid, but he can hear them anyway. Sam wonders whether he’ll get a cookie for being special. Yippee ki yay.

And suddenly, Sam knows who the guy is. “You’re Castiel,” he realises. Gabrielle’s younger brother whom she likes to complain about, but incidentally also the only family member he has ever heard her mention.

“Yes,” Castiel says, frowning. “You know-“

“Yeah, yeah, Gabrielle talks a lot about you,” Sam says and quickly extends his hand. “Hi. Nice meeting you.”

“The pleasure is all mine,” Castiel replies, although clearly quite confused now. Then he tilts his head again in a strangely adequate impression of an owl and narrows his eyes. “You are Sam Winchester.”

Sam opens and closes his mouth a few times. “Um....yeah. How do you-”

Castiel shrugs. “My sister has told me about you as well. It is the only male name she has mentioned several times. It would make sense that, if this is the only man in her classes that she is actually acquainted with, this would be the person to tell about me.” His eyes drift towards the bowl behind Sam. “Gabrielle will approve of your choice,” he says blandly, which to Sam’s tired ears sounds a little like a permission to court her or something.

Ugh. Weird.

“I must go,” Castiel says before he can answer, and picks up his books. “Can you please tell my sister that I will be home late tonight, as I have a meeting with one of my professors?”

“Yeah, sure,” Sam says, dumbstruck, and turns back to his task. There’s nothing else he can do now anyway. He thought about bailing before, sneaking into the room to get his clothes and hoping he wouldn’t wake Gabrielle so she wouldn’t know he’d stayed the night, and hell, he might have even done it in a fit of cowardice after finishing breakfast, but that was before he met Castiel. Now he has a message to deliver and feels obligated, and sure, he could just write it down but she’d recognise his handwriting and then she would definitely think he is a coward.

So he stays. Just when he finishes the first stack of pancakes, Gabrielle comes shuffling out of her room, hair done up in a lazy bun that doesn’t really manage to keep the strands from escaping and dressed in a pair of boxers and a washed-out tee that definitely does not belong to her (Sam’s first guess is that she grabbed some of her brother’s old clothes). She’s rubbing sleep from her eyes and looks sort of disoriented for a second. Sam is compelled to apply the term _adorable_ again, but luckily he only does that in his head.

“Cas?” she asks groggily and blinks when she looks up to find Sam standing in front of her instead of her brother. “Oh,” she says, drawing her arms in a circle around her. “I guess that explains the clothes I nearly tripped over.”

Sam is shocked to find that for a moment, she looks like she doesn’t know how to act. Which, okay, she probably doesn’t, because he would bet fifty bucks that she hasn’t found herself in this particular situation before, but it isn’t like her to look uncomfortable and show it. Maybe it takes her longer, he thinks, to throw on the bravado and the game face in the morning, which is an even more disturbing thought because he never actually thought it might be just that: a face. He has always been utterly convinced there is nothing throwing her off track, ever.

But then she blinks and the moment is gone and she peers around him. “Pancakes?” she asks.

“Yeah,” he says.

“Cool,” she says. “Not exactly what I expected of you, though, Mr I-only-ever-eat-salads-and-low-fat-meat.”

Sam shrugs. “I’m used to the artery-clogging food Dean stuffs into his face for breakfast. Pancakes are almost healthy in comparison.”

Gabrielle grins, takes out two plates and cutlery and, because she is Gabrielle and doesn’t do things the normal way, she doesn’t sit down on a chair but on the kitchen counter. “Dig in.” She gestures to the table, so Sam hesitantly sits down and then does exactly that. The pancakes are actually really good, so kudos to him.

“Castiel said to tell you he’d be home late due to a meeting.”

Gabrielle nods. “Alright.”

They don’t speak about anything else. The silence should be awkward as fuck, and it kind of is, but at the same time it’s sort of comfortable and if he is honest he gets a thrill out of watching Gabrielle for once not on a sugar-induced high but slowly waking up. It’s a side of her he’s never seen before – and he doubts many have – so he sits back and enjoys the show. That is, until she _drowns_ the next pancake in maple syrup and some of it sticks to the corner of her mouth and his brain sort of shuts down while his hormones project the insane need to kiss the sweet, sticky stuff away over and over again. It would be so, so fucking easy to stand up and slide between her legs and he almost wouldn’t have to bend down at all to lick into her mouth, which, uh, not a good idea. Abort, abort. He’s already made half of an idiot out of himself, he’s not going to try and act like they’re in love or something or like he can expect them to pick up where they left off when he was stupid enough to fall asleep last night.   

He clears his throat. “I...I should go,” he mutters.

Gabrielle stops chewing for a second, giving him an indecipherable look, and then nods. He scrambles out of the chair and throws on his clothes, making sure to look vaguely presentable (well, not presentable, but at least not as dishevelled as to eradiate the ‘I got laid tonight’ vibe to the entire fucking street), pulls on his shoes and heads for the door. Gabrielle waves lazily with her fork. “See you around, Sammykins,” she calls, which is as much of an acknowledgment as Sam could hope for, and maybe a promise that she isn’t angry at him and won’t stop talking to him.

He shouldn’t feel so relieved about that, but he does.

Still, he is incredibly grateful for the Christmas holidays that provide him with a Gabrielle-free time. No facing humiliation, no nothing. Two slow, blissfully work-free weeks in which he does practically nothing but read books he has wanted to read for ages, watch old movies with Dean, lounge on the couch and he decidedly does not think of Gabrielle once. He does not think about how she had felt on top of him (light and small and strong) or what she had smelled like (like what he had always imagined a day at the Mediterranean Sea must be like: like liquid sunshine and heat and salt and pine trees and peaches) or how her mouth had tasted (like _Spekulatius_ , the German Christmas cookies she is so fond of and that they sell in the German bakery round the corner, and oh, he also definitely does not think about how he even knows that), or how her laughter had sounded (quiet and breathless and wonderful).

Sam is so busy not thinking about her that his brain is melting from the effort.

They don’t talk about it when he sees her again. There is a split second of awkwardness between them, but as soon as she is assured that he won’t mention her breaking rule #2 to anyone she behaves as if nothing ever happened. Sam isn’t sure whether to be grateful or not, but it’s probably better than the alternative. Everything goes back to normal. Well, almost everything. Gabrielle continues her merry task of sleeping with as many decent looking guys as possible (and every single one of them still makes the attempt to prove someone could conquer her heart) and Sam goes back to pining from afar, only now it’s _worse_ , because it’s not only his imagination any more, but his imagination plus the knowledge that the real deal is better than anything is brain could ever come up with. But he shuts his mouth and acts as normal as possible. His chance, he knows, is over. Sometimes he thinks Gabrielle was glad that he wasn’t pushy like most of the other guys seem to be but virtuously padded out the door after making her pancakes and not talking about it again, that he continues not to make a fuss and doesn’t put on a defeated face. Gabrielle doesn’t like complicated, she likes straightforward, so he won’t make it complicated. They fucked, and it was awesome, and that’s all it was and ever will be.

Or something.

Except their strictly business relationship shifts and morphs into something else with such speed that Sam barely realises it’s begun before they are smack in the middle of it. More and more, they find themselves pairing up for projects and essays. They work well together, they’ve already established that, and it’s nice and they are pretty effective unless Gabrielle gets distracted and even so, the two of them get the work done about three times faster than anyone else. They talk a lot, too, about the little random things in life, nothing in particular just....life. Not earth-shattering revelations or soul stripteases or anything, but it’s nice.

One morning in March, she steps out the door when he jogs past, just like every morning (fun fact: he can read her sex life in her morning sports. On the days she’s not up and at ’em at the same time that he is she got laid that night and decides there’s no need for any additional physical activity that day), but for once, she follows a little faster until she catches up with him, and instead of turning right she turns left and continues running next to him. She takes two steps where he takes one, but they find a rhythm that suits them both rather quickly, and after that, with no big announcements or bells or anything, that’s what becomes their daily routine. They don’t talk there, because both listen to their own music, they just make two rounds through the park and he waves when he drops her off at her flat, and then they meet again later in class.

You could say that, within the course of a few weeks, Gabrielle becomes the person he interacts most with apart from Dean. Gradually, he starts calling her his friend, because yeah, she is the person she talks to the most, and they start telling each other about problems (possibly because Kali has hooked up with a guy called Baldur whom Gabrielle absolutely loathes and that brought on the necessity of finding someone else to bitch to about everything when her best friend doesn’t have time). Sam tells her about his dead mother, who died in a house fire when he was only a toddler and his alcoholic father who moved them around and was convinced that someone had murdered his wife and how he grew up on the road and Dean was the one who raised him. Gabrielle tells him about her family of religious fanatics, how she grew up without a mother, too, and her father was basically never there and her older brothers were always fighting, and how they threw a huge fit when she decided that no, she didn’t give a flying fuck about God and would most definitely not stay a virgin until her wedding night and ran away when she was sixteen. How Cas is practically the only one she talks to, because he rebelled and got kicked out, too, and then there are her cousins Anna and Balthazar who live far away but are kind of cool. How both Cas and her have full scholarships which they wouldn’t need because they had this uncle, Joshua, who bequeathed them a shitload of money and how that was the only way she could even finish high school.

They kind of...uh, fall into bed again only three weeks later. Sam thinks he should definitely get a cookie now, because he has made her break her two vital rules. But it probably doesn’t count, because they were both drunk as fuck (for which he entirely blames her). This time, he has the sense to leave before he falls asleep (maybe because he is _so_ close to throwing up and he doesn’t want to do it in front of her) and he knows he doesn’t imagine the relief in her eyes when he staggers out the door and she buries herself in her blankets.

Again, they don’t talk about it.

Sam thinks they are getting good at not talking about things.

Then there’s his birthday party. She’s still there when everyone else has already gone home, sitting close to him on the couch and giggling over the stupid TV show they are watching, and she curls into his side and her hot breath fans against his neck, and that’s when he decides, _fuck this_ , and picks her up and carries her into the bedroom. Add this to the ever growing list of possible colossal mistakes he’s made. It’s worth it, though.

Still, she is gone when he wakes up in the morning and there’s nothing there to indicate she was ever there at all aside from the faintly lingering smell of her skin in the sheets (and, of course, Dean’s complaints that he didn’t get any fucking sleep because his brother was too busy banging his fuck buddy. Huh. Maybe this is what they have become. Except, not really, and it doesn’t happen again for a long time. Also, brownie points for those who guessed it, they don’t talk about it. They also don’t start randomly sleeping with each other again, so he thinks the term ‘friend with benefits’ doesn’t apply. They only ever start jumping each other when they are drunk, and that’s really not a good thing). Then they go back to being friends until the end of the semester.  

During all that time, Gabrielle continues to pick up guys, and Sam has more or less come to terms with that and starts dating again, too. He doesn’t want to live celibate, after all. There is his almost hook-up with Sarah Blake, who is a truly beautiful and nice young girl with long, dark brown hair and whose personality resembles Jessica’s. She’s intelligent and sweet and bears the promise of a safe, normal, perfectly happy apple-pie life, which may or may not be why he realises they won’t work. Then there’s a week spent with amazing sex with Madison, another brunette who is tall and slender, but he decides that maybe she likes biting a little bit too much. Next in line is Ruby (again, brunette, tall and slender with dark eyes that are nothing like Gabrielle’s mesmerizing honey coloured ones, and no, that doesn’t have anything to do with anything, promise), who is into S&M and blood play. He likes that, really, until realisation hits him like a freight train.

(Maybe with the help of Dean, who can’t help but point out that he seems to have changed his type radically, from blonde and sweet to brunette and...femme fatale.)

He’s been going out with girls who are, physically, the exact opposite of Gabrielle. Taller and dark haired and generally not as tanned. He tried going for his usual type personality-wise with Sarah, who was perfect. There should not have been a moment of hesitation for him. He wants quiet and safe, doesn’t he? Except apple-pie doesn’t do anything for him anymore, and he started looking for girls who were more trouble. Like Gabrielle, who is the personification, the walking, talking epitome of trouble. Seriously, when did he stop looking for safe and started to go for vamp? Gabrielle isn’t his type, really, she’s too much like Dean (with whom she gets along perfectly, thanks to preferences of bad food and classic rock music and pranks and the perks of one-night stands and urgh, he is never comparing Dean and Gabrielle ever again when it comes to sex, because comparing his brother with the girl he wants to bang is the most gag-reflex inducing thought he has had in ages).

Anyway, the point stands. Ruby and Madison were supposed to be substitutes for a girl who was never even his girlfriend, and in the end, it worked out with neither of them because they are not the original.

That is when he realises he is completely and utterly fucked.

Instead of indulging in his freak-out properly like he wants to, he buries himself in work. Final exams are coming and they are the perfect excuse to lock himself in a private study cubicle and hide there, surrounded by heaps of books. If Gabrielle notices his weird behaviour and his unexpected and sudden desire to study alone (which is a big fat yes, because she notices everything and he’s not subtle with this one), she doesn’t comment on it. Of course she doesn’t. She’s also the one who doesn’t make a drama out of the fact that they had sex, repeatedly, unlike, well, him.

Sam glances at his watch and sighs. Half past eleven, which means he has exactly twenty-five minutes until the librarian will come in to make her round of “can I kindly remind you to get the fuck out, we’re closing at midnight” and he has a headache coming on, because he may be able to occupy himself with work during the day, but his mind runs on autopilot during the night and it just won’t shut up about his pathetic crush and how it is absolutely fucking hopeless, so he hasn’t gotten a lot of sleep lately.

Twenty-two minutes left before he has to leave and someone opens the door and slips in quietly. “Hey there, Samsquatch,” Gabrielle announces cheerfully, and Sam groans because she still won’t stop with the stupid nicknames and because the only other option would be to knock himself unconscious by introducing his head to the table repeatedly. The cubicle is for one person only, so there is really not enough space for a second person, not even for one as tiny as her, especially since he takes up more space than most.

Apparently, the obvious solution to this problem for Gabrielle is to drop herself into his lap, legs on either side of his thighs and God, can someone please kill him now? “Still here, huh?” she says. Sam frowns, because it isn’t like Gabrielle to point out the obvious. “You’ll make that pretty head of yours explode from over-usage,” she continues lightly, and flicks her fingers against his forehead, pouting.

“That so?” he asks and leans back a little to create more space between them, as if that could help his lower regions to not get excited (that, of course, is a lost cause).

“Uh-huh,” she nods. And then she tilts her head in a way reminiscent of Castiel (the only thing, perhaps, that she and her brother share) and seems to make a decision. “I know better things we can do in here to make sure your brain gets a break,” she says and leans forward, presses up against him and kisses him.

In the back of his mind, he vaguely realises that this is an important milestone or something, because apart from the first time they slept with each other, she never actively decided to proposition him. They were drunk and they fell all over each other and he thinks neither of them was one hundred percent aware of their choices, but this, now, sober and not in the aftermath of a party, this is important. This is Gabrielle choosing to have sex with him, consciously, very well aware that she is breaking her number one rule. Again.

He only muses about this for a second, though, because dammit, they have twenty minutes before they will be interrupted and his hands have found their way under her skirt already anyway, so his upstairs brain is not going to do much thinking from now on. He uses his last moment of non-sex related thought to draw the curtain in front of the window closed, although it is highly unlikely anyone besides him uses the library that late on a Monday night, and then he just hoists her up on the table and makes sure they make the best of the next couple of minutes.

Sam comes to the conclusion, later, that semi-public quickies are definitely his kind of thing, but maybe that’s only because they manage to flee long before the librarian comes around and won’t have to see her face when she sniffs the scent of sex in the air. They leave the door wide open, just to make sure it disperses a little, but even so Sam thinks he won’t be using the cubicles again, because, yeah, awkward. Also, he’s not sure he can ever look at one of these things the same way again (just like the wall on the left in the corridor of Gabrielle’s flat, where he fucked her the second time around. He still can’t quite look at that one without it triggering memories and mostly unwanted bodily reactions).

He thinks she wants to pulls away, but he slings an arm around her shoulders (which fits perfectly, because she is so tiny it feels like he doesn’t even have to lift his arm at all) and tucks her into his side and they walk to her apartment. Cas isn’t there that night, she assures him, which is good, because he when they finally arrive it’s only been twenty minutes since leaving the library and he still thinks he can’t keep his hands off her for a second longer and dammit, they have already stopped, like, five times to make out like horny teenagers on the way.

Still, when she jumps into his arms and wraps her legs around his hip as soon as the door falls shut behind them, he listens to his inner voice that tells him that this is not what they should do. Not now.

Well, it’s not like he opposes the sex in general or anything. It’s just that this right here? Is exactly what they’ve been doing for half a year. They’ve fucked, and it’s been awesome, but it’s time to acknowledge that it’s developed into something more now. Sam thinks, absentmindedly, that Gabrielle probably still doesn’t want to admit it. She wants to think that this is her, breaking rule #1 again, but it’s still only sex, no strings attached, but the thing is, it’s _not_ and he won’t let her fool herself any longer.

He likes the passionate sex they’ve been having. He really, really does. Despite his romantic heart, he isn’t always overly fond of taking things slow and being sweet and gentle, not when it comes to sex, and he likes that what they had was always hot and a little rough and one hundred percent physical. From only three nights he has gathered masturbation material that could last half a lifetime, and yeah, that’s nice. But now, things are about to change. They have changed already, and it’s time to make it official.

So maybe Gabrielle doesn’t do love. Maybe this isn’t even love, but it’s more than sex, and he _likes_ her, more than he has ever liked anyone although she is everything he never would have wanted if he were in his right mind, and she is annoying and loud-mouthed and a little smartass and stubborn. He likes her anyway, he likes her _because_ of it, which is even more inapprehensible, but he’s not going to argue with himself anymore. He knows he is in love with her, and it’s time Gabrielle knew it. He also knows that she would laugh at him and dismiss it with a wave of her hand if he said that out loud, so he will just have to resort to other methods.

Which is exactly what he does.

He carries her into her room and lays her down on the soft mattress and forces her to slow down, although she struggles obstinately against his hold and glares at him when he doesn’t get a move on, but Sam doesn’t let himself be deterred. He takes his time removing her clothes and swats her hands away when she tugs at his impatiently. Sam can see her growing frustrated to the point where she tries to pull out all the stops to pull him off track, but he has set his mind on the task and this time, that won’t work. He _does_ have the physical advantage, after all, and he’s not ashamed to use it for that. He lowers himself between her legs and lets her take off his shirt – he’s not a sadist, after all – but that’s as far as she’s allowed to go for now. He starts kissing her, every inch of her body, tasting her salty skin with his tongue until she finally stops squirming and exhales a shuddery breath and relaxes into his touch, giving him silent permission to worship her body, worship _her_. He takes his time exploring her, from her breasts to her navel and the curve of her hipbone, listening to her sighs and quiet moans.

That, too, is new. Gabrielle is _vocal_. She always is; she has the mouth of a sailor in everyday life, and she definitely always talks dirty and yes, she is quite the screamer. But now, as he presses his lips to the warmth between her legs and licks over her clit, all she does is clench one hand into the sheets and bite down on the skin of the other to keep the sounds from escaping. He works her open slowly with his tongue and his fingers, draws it out until she is a sobbing, shaking mess below him and begging him for more (another novelty; she takes what she wants, she never begs, never), so Sam withdraws and kicks off his jeans and his boxers and reaches for the condoms he knows she keeps in her drawer.

Gabrielle watches him, breathing heavily, and regains enough of her coherency to threaten him. “If you don’t come over here right fucking now I might have to kill you.”

Sam thinks to himself that if he doesn’t he might simply die because there soon won’t be enough blood in his brain to keep his vital functions working correctly, but he doesn’t say anything because this isn’t about him. He just kisses her to shut her up, and because kissing is nice, and she sighs quietly when he pushes in and starts moving slowly inside of her. Gabrielle is still muttering half-hearted curses against his mouth, but she stops pushing and demanding more and just melts against him, against his mouth, mingling their breaths, and he swears he can feels their hearts beating in sync.

He thinks that it’s been a long, long time since anyone has made love to her. Since she has _let_ anyone make love to her.

Sam can feel her approaching the edge as she buries her face in the crook of his neck, and he draws back a little to get a good look at her face. Her eyes are screwed shut (again, not something she usually does) and he pushes in a little deeper, a little more intent, making her moan. “Look at me,” he murmurs into her ear. “Look at me, Gabrielle.”

She swallows and inhales deeply and blinks her eyes open. Her pupils are blown and wide and her eyes full of wonder and fear, and Goddammit, he should have known Gabrielle would be afraid of that, of making herself vulnerable.

Sam doesn’t kiss her, he just rests his forehead against hers and tangles their fingers together between the sheets and doesn’t take his eyes off her for a second when he begins to move again. His name falls from her lips in a broken sob (“Sam, oh God, Sam”) for the first time in all the times they’ve been together like this, and then her grip on his hand tightens and her walls clench and tremble around him. She is beautiful when she comes, eyes wide open and her face completely open and honest and all of her laid bare before him, and that alone is enough to push Sam over the edge, too, and he thinks he probably comes harder than he ever has before.

He doesn’t know how long they stay like this, their limbs intertwined and just trying to regain their breaths, except that he moves to the side as to not crush her with his weight. Eventually, though, she pulls away a little to turn on her back and throws an arm over her face.

“Damn,” she says, her voice rough, “you’re gonna try and turn me into a decent, reputable woman, aren’t you?”

“Hell, no,” he says, mildly horrified. “I like you just the way you are.”

“Good,” she murmurs into his skin, shuffles a little until she is comfortable, and falls asleep in his arms.

Waking up next to her seems like the most natural thing in the world. Sam makes pancakes again because Gabrielle isn’t nearly as much of a morning person as he would have guessed from her early rounds in the park (and come to think of it, maybe that’s why they never talked there), and it feels like he’s done it a thousand times already. Only he’s only ever done this for her once before, and this time he _is_ allowed to kiss away the syrup sticking to her lips, and that’s pretty fucking awesome in itself.

He’s more than a little surprised, though, when she actually allows him to take her hand when they walk to campus and even lets him hold open the door for her, because Gabrielle laughs at chivalry and thinks it’s fucking ridiculous and romantic PDA is totally overrated. It takes him a while to figure out that this might be her trying to compromise, and as such, acknowledging that they are, without actually talking about it, in a relationship that she is willing to make an effort to sustain. He had hoped they would come to this point eventually, but knowing that Gabrielle doesn’t do relationships he wouldn’t have expected her to fly the flag on the first day. People spotting them hand in hand mostly react with incredulity and look like their eyeballs are about to pop out of their sockets, but he was kind of expecting that.

Sam kind of expected more of a fuss about it, really, but the truth is, nothing really changes. Yes, they are officially an item and he doesn’t have blue balls anymore because there is lots of mind-blowing sex, and he has an arm around Gabrielle more often than not, but aside from that, their relationship doesn’t mutate into something different. They don’t really go out on dates, because Gabrielle hates that, and prefer to spend their days and evenings lounging lazily on the couch and laughing at horrible cop and/or law shows. They still go jogging in the morning without saying a word to each other. They keep working together and seeing their respective friends and just generally being a pretty good team and good friends. She doesn’t wear longer skirts or tops that show less cleavage and he still strictly refuses to cut his hair just because she demands that he do so.

Gabrielle doesn’t make a big deal out of their relationship and she doesn’t talk about feelings or goals or their future, because she says it just is what it is and they’re going to see what time brings. Sam can work with that, mostly. Sometimes he wishes he knew what she actually wants from him.

Of course, it’s not all unicorns and rainbows and sunshine. Their fights, when they have them (the serious ones, not the small, mostly playful arguments they engage in almost every day), are more epic than the _Iliad_. Because Gabrielle is stubborn as shit and extremely opinionated and Sam has anger management issues and when he explodes, then he _explodes_. But the make up sex is glorious and okay, sometimes it takes them a day or two to even start talking to each other again and get to the stage where make up sex is in order, but they always make up.

Them always being together also leads to them introducing Dean to Castiel. Dean’s subsequent hysterical sexual identity crisis is possibly the most hilarious thing that has ever happened to Sam, and Gabrielle agrees that they are made for each other (which is funny, because they, too, are like polar opposites), but when Sam suggests they hook their respective brothers up just to stop the frustrated eye-fucking that is starting to make him feel nauseated, she clams up and changes the subject more quickly than he can blink.

Sam frowns, and thinks that there is something going majorly wrong.

He wakes up the next morning in Gabrielle’s bed but with a noticeable lack of warm, soft woman in his arms. For a split second he panics, because they are almost six months into their relationship and she’s been behaving weirdly lately and maybe he screwed up something or she’s just getting sick of him and needs her freedom back and this will be the end of it. Which, yeah, is in retrospect a total overreaction, but she’s never up before him, and he knows he won’t be able to keep her, he _knows_ it just as he knows that he can’t randomly fall off the earth, because she is beautiful and fierce and fleeting and not meant to stay in one place, and in the end, he was always going to turn out to be too boring for her.    

Then her voice drifts over from the living room, and he can hear her pacing up and down and talking agitatedly. Sam knows he has absolutely no right to listen in on their conversation, even if he is Gabrielle’s boyfriend, because she treasures her privacy, but he hears his name and thinks that fuck, if she is going to break up with him he’d like a head start to make sure he doesn’t fall to pieces in front of her when she breaks it to him.

What he hears instead is Gabrielle having her first honest to God emotional breakdown. He doesn’t catch the beginning of the speech, but the rest goes approximately like this: “...don’t understand, Kali, they are made for each other, like, ‘you jump I jump’ made for each other, love you to the moon and back, till death do us part and all that shit and if they get together they’ll probably marry and ask me to be Godmother to their adopted dogs or something and-“

“I really don’t see your problem, Gabby,” Kali says, annoyed. “I thought you wanted your brother to be happy.”

“I do! I do and I think Dean can make him happy, but what if-”

“But what if _what_?”

“What if Sam and I don’t work out? What if we break up? Dean and Sam are really close and I know that every time I’ll visit my brother I’ll see him and I don’t think I could – I couldn’t – and I couldn’t stay away because Cas is the only family I have left but how could I possibly –“

Sam doesn’t think he has ever heard her stutter so much. Also, he has, despite his high intelligence and generally much acclaimed understanding of the female nature, some really worrying troubles following her argumentation.

Kali actually slaps her over the head. “You,” she says matter-of-factly, “are an idiot.”

“I know,” Gabrielle whines and flops on the couch next to her. “I know I’m being unfair to Cas-“

“That’s not what I’m talking about,” Kali interrupts her. “Gabby, the boy is crazy for you. He hasn’t left you yet, and judging from the puppy dog eyes he’s giving you it’s unlikely he’s going to dump your ass anytime soon. And I know you like to run away before things get serious to make sure you don’t get hurt and all that crap and have the worst commitment phobia I have ever seen, but this is bordering on ridiculous. I know you’re scared shitless because you’re actually in love with Sam and now can’t help but think of all the ways this could go horribly wrong, but I swear to you, if you walk out now, best friend or not, I might have to kill you. Now get it together, wonder woman, and vagina up,”

“...vagina up?”

“I was going to say sac up, but balls are really too sensitive for that phrase to make any sense.”

Gabrielle huffs out a weak laugh. “The feminist side of me approves.”

“Good, then.” Kali picks up her jacket and kisses her on the temple. “Call me when you’re over your little freak-out.”

Sam only just gets it together enough to tiptoe back into bed and pretend he’s sleeping in case Gabrielle comes back into the bedroom. He’s still not quite sure this exchange actually happened, and he doesn’t quite know what to make of it. He and Gabrielle don’t talk about their feelings. Mostly that’s because Gabrielle is silver-tongued unless it comes to emotions that go beyond the standard “happy”, and “pissed off”. He swears, she’s even worse than Dean sometimes, and he’d have better chances of getting a brick wall to talk than to get her to talk about where they stand in their relationship. It’s been frustrating him for a while now, too, because Sam thinks it’s kind of important to communicate, and he’s really been wanting to tell her that he loves her, except that he’s been afraid she’d throw a bowl at his head. Gabrielle doesn’t use the L-word unless she’s talking about how much she loves chocolate, and skittles, and sex. She definitely doesn’t use it for people. Okay, she doesn’t really have to, because Sam is not stupid and he knows that her committing to a six months relationship means something, but a) it would be nice to hear it and b) they could have saved themselves a lot of drama.

Still, he hadn’t thought she was that serious about it. He feels better now, although he would have preferred her telling him herself.

Aside from that, the idea that he would dump her is really ludicrous, because right now he’d rather hack off his left hand than leave her. And dammit, they really need to talk about her issues here, because all of this could have been avoided if she’d just fucking opened her mouth sometimes.

It takes her almost half an hour until she gathers the courage to crawl back under the covers beside him. Sam feigns sleepiness and being still half-dreaming and just pulls her close and runs his hands through her hair. A couple of minutes of this, and he just sort of blurts it out because he cannot for the life of him hold the words in.

“I love you.”

Gabrielle tenses in his arms for a second, and he thinks that she probably knows he listened in on their conversation now, and fuck, it really wasn’t the smoothest way nor the best moment, but he’s been wanting to say it for weeks now and he knows that if they’re now at a stage in their relationship where that is true, he’ll have to be the one to say it first anyway, because she sure as hell isn’t going to start.

She doesn’t say anything, but she snuggles a little closer and Sam, despite wanting to kick himself in the head for not choosing a better moment, counts this as a victory.

Three weeks later, he’s still waiting for her to say it back. Much like it had been with him, it’s more of an accident than anything else, which...figures, actually. They’ve spent most of the day bickering at each other because both are in a bad mood (there’s a lot of stuff to study and they have another group work, except they are in different groups this time and her partners didn’t even bother to show up at the meeting) and she’s bitchy and moody, it’s really late in the night but she’s still poring over the books trying to get the work of three people done alone, because she needs that fucking grade and cannot afford to screw this presentation up when Sam decides enough is enough and sets down a cup of Starbucks chocolate mocha and a box of caramel ice cream in front of her.

Gabrielle blinks up at him, then at the goodies and sighs. “God, I love you.” Which maybe isn’t the heartfelt confession he was hoping for, but it bleeds honesty in every vowel and that’s good enough for him.

And then she freezes in shock and looks like she is about two seconds away from another panic attack.

And as much as Sam wants to cherish that moment and turn it into something special, he is also a really good boyfriend and knows she is not ready for fanfares or anything, so he just shrugs and sits down next to her and says, “I know.”

Gabrielle silently grabs for her coffee and he guesses from the way she eyes it that she wishes there was some alcohol in it. Then he figures if she hasn’t gotten up and run away from the conversation so far, then maybe it’s time he put his cards on the table.

“You know I’m not going anywhere, right?” he asks. 

“Sam.”

“No, let me say this. If it’s too schmoopy, I promise I’ll not bring it up again, but I need to say this and I think you need to hear it once, too,” he says. “You are the most annoying person I’ve ever met. You’re loud, and you always argue back and you always have to have the last word. Watching you eat candy all the time gives me toothaches, and I honestly think you’ll have a heart attack before you turn fifty if you go on like this. You’re even messier than Dean and _definitely_ even more romantically inept, which shouldn’t be possible but you somehow pull it off. You hog the covers and I really think the putting salt in my coffee instead of sugar thing is overdone. You drive me up the wall, you really do, and you’re the most amazing and beautiful woman I have ever met, and you know, I always wanted a picket-fence house in the suburbs and maybe a kid or two and a dog and you’re more likely to get us a crocodile or something, but I love you and I think you might be the woman of my life and I’m never going to leave you.”

Gabrielle stares. Then she says. “You’ve got OCD, you love your laptop way too much, you live on rabbit food and you are every bit as stubborn as I am. You and your brother are ridiculously co-dependent on each other and you snore and you sing awfully off-tune when you’re under the shower, did I ever tell you that? And I never wanted to be in any kind of relationship,  not before I turned, like, thirty or something, but then you came along with your stupid smile and your stupid puppy dog eyes and your super-sized brain and you keep making me laugh and you keep coming around no matter how insufferable I am, and I don’t think I’ll ever understand why, but the thing is, I like my life better this way and...” she breaks off abruptly, but by this time, Sam is already smiling like crazy.

“Where’s the part where you say that you love me and imagine us sitting together on a park bench holding hands when we’re both old and grey?”

“Fuck you,” Gabrielle scoffs and pushes the ice cream container towards him. “My life is turning into a fucking rom com and I’m not having that.”

Sam uses her spoon while the endorphins in his body throw a street party. Gabrielle sharing her beloved sweets is as close to a love confession as she’ll ever get without using words. “We’ll have to work on your communication skills,” he points out.

Gabrielle looks at him, and nods.

“Okay.”

 

 


End file.
